Experts have also identified more than 22,000 prime sites around Australia where additional pumped hydro storage could be quickly built.

Turnbull offers Queensland power station funding if it votes LNP in state poll

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The Kidston mine project, being built by Genex Power with some assistance from the Australian Renewable Energy Agency, starts with a solar farm that will be ready to send power to households during the coming summer.

The Genex executive director, Simon Kidston, says the first electricity will be generated in the first week of December and it will be brought up to the full 50 megawatt capacity by early February.

The company is finalising its finance to build the second phase of the project and is close to receiving approval for a loan from the federal government’s Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility.

The plan is to build a world-first integration of solar generation and pumped hydro storage, repurposing the two 300-metre deep disused mine pits to create 250MW capacity that can run for six hours continuously.

For a while it looked as if a plan to turn fruit waste into electricity might bring light for a giant Nigerian market – but then, like so many other power plans, nothing happened. When will renewables really come on line?